RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 The DEAD box RNA helicase Ddx39a is essential for myocyte and lens development in zebrafish
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 209650
DO 10.1101/209650
A1 Linlin Zhang
A1 Beibei Li
A1 Yuxi Yang
A1 Ian C. Scott
A1 Xin Lou
YR 2017
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/10/26/209650.abstract
AB RNA helicases from the DEAD-box family are found in almost all organisms and have important roles in RNA metabolism including RNA synthesis, processing and degradation. The function and mechanism of action of most of these helicases in animal development and human disease are largely unexplored. In a zebrafish mutagenesis screen to identify genes essential for heart development we identified a zebrafish mutant, which disrupts the gene encoding the RNA helicase DEAD-box 39a (ddx39a).Homozygous ddx39a mutant embryos exhibit profound cardiac and trunk muscle dystrophy, along with lens abnormalities caused by abrupt terminal differentiation of cardiomyocyte, myoblast and lens fiber cells. Further investigation indicated that loss of ddx39a hindered mRNA splicing of members of the kmt2 gene family, leading to mis-regulation of structural gene expression in cardiomyocyte, myoblast and lens fiber cells. Taken together, these results show that Ddx39a plays an essential role in establishment of proper epigenetic status during cell differentiation.